


The Light of a Flickering Candle

by KChan88



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Era, Combeferre & Enjolras Platonic Life Partners, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fever, Gen, Major Character Injury, Mental Health Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-05
Updated: 2020-05-05
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:35:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24009709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KChan88/pseuds/KChan88
Summary: "Enjolras feels heavy. His feet. His arms. His bones. Everything around him feels heavy, too. The stars. The night sky they’re stitched into, like it might bear down on his flat and make the roof cave in."In the disappointing aftermath of 1830, an injured Enjolras deals with his grief. When he isolates himself from his friends, it doesn't go without notice.
Comments: 32
Kudos: 46
Collections: Les Mis Big Bang: Quarantine Edition





	The Light of a Flickering Candle

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of the Les Mis Quarantine Big Bang Event! Art is by the lovely noodleofsunshine.

** August 7, 1830. **

“Enjolras, stop fidgeting,” Combeferre mutters, irritation slicing through his tone. “You never fidget.”

They’re in the small bedroom of Combeferre’s flat, the rest of their friends in the sitting room just beyond. The two of them went in under the auspices of looking for a book, though the length of time passing surely might make some of their friends—Courfeyrac and Feuilly chief among them, given their suspicious gazes—wonder what’s taking so long. Though…Enjolras supposes Combeferre launching into a long explanation about something is not out of the question.

“Apologies,” Enjolras mutters, hating the flat sound of his voice. Hating that he can’t _hide_ the flat sound. Hating that he isn’t himself. The world sits on his shoulders, and he isn’t Atlas, much as he might like to be. He can’t hold it today, like he usually does.

He feels so _vulnerable_. So deeply human, but there’s so much in the world, so much he needs to _do_ , that he isn’t sure there’s time for his own humanity. His weariness. His grief.

Where is that resilience he so relies upon, glimmering gold in the dark?

He’s not terribly good at fooling Combeferre on a good day, let alone right now. He looks around at the room instead, filled as it always is with well-ordered chaos. At least, that’s what Combeferre calls it. Books are stacked on the shelves and on the floor nearby, organized in some way Enjolras can’t make sense of, though Combeferre seems to be able to, somehow. There’s papers on the desk, mostly things from the medical school and a few things with hieroglyphs, with some pamphlets from their society scattered throughout. There’s a skull on the desk too, though Enjolras is sure it once belonged to Prouvaire.

His friends’ shared oddness is the only thing that’s made Enjolras smile all day.

Combeferre doesn’t answer.

He examines the bayonet wound Enjolras received several days ago on the barricades instead, his spectacles slipping down his nose and his eyebrows furrowed. “I’ve redone the stitching,” he finally says. “It’s deeper than it seemed at first, try not to move about too much. I think you ripped the suture from walking around too much, or it would have been more on its way to healing.” He softens, just a little, looking up at Enjolras rather than the wound. “You could stay here. You do half the time, anyway.”

“No, no.” Enjolras waves the suggestion away, pulling his shirt back down over the newly stitched wound. “That’s all right.”

He got the wound just near the end of the fighting, the metal slashing the skin just under his ribcage. He almost didn’t notice, at first, full of adrenaline and excitement as he was, until the pain came, and the blood, though the latter was covered by his coat. It was later, when he showed Combeferre, that it seemed to hurt worse and bleed more. He aggravated it in the commotion, no doubt.

“Hmm,” Combeferre says in response to that, sounding like he wants to argue the point, like he already has a three-pronged argument ready, but he doesn’t. “I still don’t know why you insist on not telling the others about this.”

“It’s not serious,” Enjolras replies, sliding his waistcoat back on. “They’ll worry, and they need not. There’s enough going on.”

Enjolras listens to the half-silence on the other side of Combeferre’s door, punctuated now and again by a comment from Courfeyrac or a loud swear from Bahorel as he reads the paper, and sometimes Jehan muttering something not-so-softly under his breath like he’s thinking aloud. Charles abdicated, but they found out only a few hours ago that the provisional government has selected a new king, Louis-Philippe, who has agreed to rule as a constitutional monarch. A king for a king.

Needless to say, none of them are happy about such an outcome. 

Some who fought on the barricades might be appeased, but he certainly is not. Normally his blood would scorch over news like this. He would think. He would plan. He would march forward into the bloody sunrise and say what next? What of tomorrow?

But right now…

Right now he just feels…sad. He grieves the sharp loss of all he felt in those three days of fighting, that feeling of victory in the air, that new horizon in his grasp, the sublime, astonishing joy of seeing all those people flooding the streets of Paris and fighting for something after years and years of work.

It was an utterly singular emotion.

Change is happening, certainly, change that was made by people raising their voices and saying _we are here, and you will listen_ , but his faith remains with the people, and not with the new king. Or any king at all.

A king is a king, and the flaw is in the institution.

He will not spit in the face of any progress and say _it must be all or it must be nothing_. He understands the complexities, the sacrifices, the ups and downs of any steps forward. But he will also not believe in the false promises of a man who’s been seeking power for years.

He will not believe in a king.

_But his father was a Jacobin! He was a Jacobin! His father voted for the king’s execution during the revolution!_

A Jacobin Louis-Phillipe might have been, but he was a deserter, as well, and all things considered, Enjolras prefers his enemies to show themselves clearly, and not pretend to be otherwise.

“Bahorel…” Joly says from the sitting room. “Put the paper down, you’re going to make yourself ill, you’ve read it twenty times already.”

“I’m just looking for someone else to curse at,” Bahorel argues. There’s the sound of someone snatching the paper out of his hands, and a noise of protest. “Feuilly! Give me that back.”

“No.”

“Fiend,” Bahorel mutters. “You’ve read it at least fifteen times, I _saw_ you.”

“Don’t argue with Feuilly, dear,” Jehan says softly, sad and half caught up in something else.

Bossuet has the courage to laugh in a tired sort of way, and Courfeyrac says something like _hear hear_ in a short, agitated tone, like a cat grown tired of stimulation, before Bahorel sighs magnificently.

“See?” Enjolras turns back to Combeferre. “They’re all upset already.”

“Hmm,” Combeferre says again, though less sharply than before. He pauses, tilting his head and grasping Enjolras’ fingers. “Are you all right, Enjolras?”

Enjolras tries a smile, but it hurts deep down in his chest. “As well as any of us. Disappointed. But we have to keep moving forward.”

“Yes,” Combeferre replies. “But I think we ought to take care of ourselves, in the immediate moment.” He looks Enjolras in the eye. “And that includes you.”

Enjolras tries the smile again, and he feels a little like he’s telling a lie.

“I know.” 

* * *

** Three Days Later. **

Enjolras feels heavy. His feet. His arms. His bones. Everything around him feels heavy, too. The stars. The night sky they’re stitched into, like it might bear down on his flat and make the roof cave in.

He knew they might lose. He knew they might not achieve their ends because doing that takes years and years of effort. Dedication. Focus. And even then, you might backslide. You do not win all at once and then face no obstacles. The Revolution is proof enough of that.

He knew all that, and he still feels so…

So….

He can’t let himself grieve, because the work isn’t done. Why can’t he think, why can’t he just _do_ , why can’t he….

This isn’t who he is. This isn’t what he _does_.

He sits up from against his pillows, still fully dressed at this late hour. He feels a little cold, despite the summer heat outside. One of the hottest in recent memory. Exhaustion creeps through his veins, but he couldn’t sleep if he tried. He feels certain of that.

He was supposed to meet Combeferre, Courfeyrac, and Feuilly three hours ago and he simply…didn’t.

He dressed. He planned to go. Yet somehow, he couldn’t make himself leave. He felt paralyzed, like too many feelings were too close to the surface. He’s never missed a meeting with his friends like this, and he’s angry at himself for making them worry, but then, perhaps they won’t worry, perhaps they’ll think he simply got caught up in his work, and missed the time.

_No they won’t_ , a small, irritable voice says in the back of his head.

Perhaps he didn’t go because he always wants to be the best version of himself for his friends, and he simply isn’t, right now.

He needs to find his way out of this.

He needs a walk. Yes. A walk will do.

Combeferre would not approve of the walk, surely, not with the wound, but he needs to _think_. The wound twinges a little like it’s telling him no, but Enjolras ignores it. He remembers the feeling of the tip of cold metal slicing against his skin as he kicked the soldier away with one swift movement. He remembers putting his hand to his side and coming away with blood, a few drops falling to the shattered paving stones at his feet. He remembers the cry of victory a few minutes later that almost made him forget about the wound entirely.

_The Hotel de Ville has been captured!_

With the Tuileries Palace sacked earlier in the day, he knew it was over, then. He looked out at the blue sky and saw tricolors hanging from building after building, the chorus of 4,000 barricades ringing out across Paris.

He undoes his cream-colored cravat when he steps outside, annoyed at the feeling of the fabric against his skin even as he pulls his coat tighter around him. He’s wearing his pale red waistcoat, a gift from Courfeyrac for his last birthday. It’s not something he would have picked out for himself, but he likes it.

_It’s not as bold as Bahorel’s true Robespierre waistcoat_ , Courfeyrac said as Enjolras opened the package with an inquisitive smile. _But I think it suits you. No need for you to always wear dark colors, you know._

The streets are quiet now, filled with the memory of the fighting, and people still perhaps a bit anxious about straying too far from their homes. But Paris is Paris, and all will return to normal soon enough, or whatever normal can possibly be, when governments are constantly changing. People will forget the bodies. They will forget the blood stuck between the paving stones. They will say _it is change enough_. Not everyone will, of course, because Paris, France itself is nothing if not a match waiting to be struck. But some, fearful of yet more violence, more loss, might try.

This is _not_ change enough, and history will mark it as such.

A thousand people dead, they said.

And another king is what they get for it. A different king, they say, a better king, but even if the the ultra-royalists might be no more in any way that matters—for which Enjolras is grateful—he at least knows that enemy. He does not trust this new one, no matter how popular he might be at present.

The citizen king, he’s heard some call him. A contradiction in terms. The sacrifices made in those three glorious days demanded something more.

Enjolras cannot allow himself the enormity of these emotions, the enormity of this sadness he feels at being so close and having it snatched away. He brushes a stray hair out of his eye and sticks his hand in his pockets in an ungraceful sort of way Courfeyrac would say wasn’t like him.

He doesn’t _feel_ like him.

He feels too much all the time. Anger at the state of things. Melancholy, too. But he puts those emotions into action. He channels them into his work, the work he shares with his friends.

Tonight…tonight he feels paralyzed. Not hopeless, he could never be hopeless just…he goes back to the heavy feeling from before. He keeps walking, hoping hoping hoping the heaviness will vanish, that he’ll think of a way to move forward and leave this sadness behind him, or at least put it to use. Grief seems to trickle from his fingertips when he takes his hands out of his pockets again, and when he looks down he thinks he sees it turn to blood, drip drip dripping into the crevices of the paving stones.

He flinches.

That violence is a part of this, will be a part of this for a long time, he’s known for ages. He’s accepted it. Even wished it, because theirs is not a peaceful world, not yet, but it doesn’t make the images in his head vanish. The sounds of the fighting, the whiz of the bullets and the clang of a bayonet. The acrid, smoky scent in the air. The screams of the wounded.

He has to keep going. If he lets this grief at what might have been settle in his chest, he fears it will get the better of him. He fears he will tumble down into the deep.

A chill runs through him, holding him in an uncomfortable grasp before loosening its grip, though it doesn’t quite let go.

He walks for a half hour or so, finding himself very near to the site of their barricade. They weren’t alone as they fought, taking part with another society of republican men that Bahorel knew. Given the sheer swath of people angry at Charles, the people participating in the rebellion were varied, and as Bahorel so aptly put it _well, Enjolras, I would never have us fighting with any of the more conservative sort. I couldn’t bear it!_

Enjolras stops in his tracks. All traces of the barricade are gone, but some of the paving stones are still ripped up, and he hears the shouts and the gunfire from the day, the cries of victory, the moment where his heart shot up from his chest to his throat and he thought _here it is, the moment where we take the Revolution back._

Fury was in the air, leading up to July. The ordinances suspending the liberty of the press. Charles dissolving parliament and delaying elections. He could go on, and he knew something was coming, and come it did.

Except now…

Now he fears this will be just enough change to make people complacent. _The bad king is gone!_ _Lafayette embraced him! He came out wrapped in the tricolor at the Hotel de Ville, didn’t you see?_

Enjolras certainly did see, and he cursed Lafayette for being willing to sail across the Atlantic to rid America of their English king, and yet be perfectly content to put one on France’s throne.

He knows he musn’t be complacent. He musn’t _rest_ until…

He takes a long, sharp breath as another chill rips through him.

Why is he so cold?

Tears brim in his eyes and he blinks them back and away and he _aches_ , suddenly. His legs. His whole body just…hurts.

He turns back toward home, knowing he should get there, sensing that something is wrong. He’s tired, too, so it takes longer than it ought, and by the time he walks across his threshold he’s stumbling, and his wound gives another twinge. He feels…weak. When did he eat, last?

He’s too cold to take off his coat so he slips a hand beneath it, coming away with a smear of red across his fingertips.

_Oh._

The last thing he feels is a wave of overwhelming dizziness before crashing, unconscious, to the sitting room floor. 

* * *

“He might have fallen asleep?”

Courfeyrac’s almost statement ends as a question instead, his voice going up a little higher. It’s a sign he thinks he’s wrong, but wants to be reassuring, anyway, Combeferre’s known him long enough to know that. Generally unappreciative of empty reassurances—compassion is different, and he has plenty of that to spare—he actually likes the trait in Courfeyrac, whose words are never empty of anything, but tonight, he has little patience for it.

Enjolras never misses appointments.

“He didn’t fall asleep,” Combeferre snaps, feeling guilty as soon as the sharp words leave his mouth.

“It would be unlike him,” Feuilly adds as they go along. “He’s not known for napping, really.”

“Feuilly,” Courfeyrac protests.

“Sorry, sorry.”

Combeferre shakes his head, stopping his hurried walk and grasping Courfeyrac’s hand. “I’m sorry I’m being short. I’m just worried. Enjolras wasn’t himself a few days ago, and now this.”

Courfeyrac presses his hand tight before ushering him forward, the three of them keeping a good pace as they go.

“You should also know,” Combeferre adds. “That I haven’t…er…been telling you the entire truth.”

“I know,” Courfeyrac says, sounding slightly hurt but nonetheless good-natured. “I can tell when you’re keeping a secret, Combeferre. I can’t always, with Enjolras, he’s terribly good at playing things close to the vest, so when he _wasn’t_ good at it, it was easy to notice.”

Feuilly bites his lip, and nods. “It’s true.”

Combeferre stops again, spinning around. “Wait, you both knew?”

“We didn’t know what,” Courfeyrac confesses. “We just knew it was something.” He frowns, a strange and upsetting thing. “Combeferre, what’s wrong with Enjolras?”

“Something more than I know, I think,” Combeferre answers. “But what I do know is that he had a small wound from the barricade. A bayonet slash. A touch deep, but nothing too terrible. If he didn’t aggravate it, that is. He asked me not to tell anyone until it was better, and I protested, but didn’t break the promise. I know, I should have, but he seemed so…sad. He has bouts of melancholy sometimes, but this was different. I expected his anger at this outcome, and not what I ended up with. I should have made him stay with me, and not let him go.”

“I’m not sure you can _make_ Enjolras do anything,” Feuilly says with fondness, twisting his hat in his hands.

Combeferre expects Courfeyrac to lecture him about hiding the wound, but he just ushers them forward again, with something like a _remind me to shout at you later_ on his breath. They arrive at Enjolras’ building a few minutes later, and Combeferre digs the spare key out of his pocket as they go up the stairs.

Except, he sees he doesn’t need the key once they reach the landing, because the door is partway open.

That’s not like Enjolras at _all_.

“What the _devil_?” Courfeyrac mutters, as Feuilly gives a little gasp of surprise.

He spies an arm through the crack, and oh god, has Enjolras been robbed? Or more likely, did he do something he shouldn’t have, and end up aggravating his wound? Enjolras is vastly responsible in most cases, but that _most_ is what matters here. He certainly isn’t above being stubborn about an injury, and he was in such a strange mood, a few days ago.

His mind spins, and he centers himself.

Enjolras needs him, and he must keep his head straight.

He pushes open the door to find Enjolras on the floor, his cheeks pink and swiftly veering toward red.

Combeferre doesn’t feel foolish for bringing his medical bag, now.

“Enjolras?” Combeferre questions, going to his knees beside his friend in an instant.

Without a word, without being asked, Feuilly dashes to retrieve a cloth, dipping it in a pitcher of water nearby and handing it to Combeferre. Combeferre takes it gratefully, wiping away some of the sweat on Enjolras’ forehead, and hoping that the fever, which must have taken hold without Enjolras paying mind, might already be breaking, or trying to, at least.

Enjolras cracks his eyes open, whispering a soft, tiny _Combeferre,_ before closing them again.

“Courfeyrac, help me get his coat off, would you?”

Enjolras, apparently awake enough to protest, curls in on himself.

“I know, you’re probably cold, aren’t you?” Combeferre says, feeling a little bit like he might cry, but he can’t just be Enjolras’ friend, right now, he has to be his doctor, too. “I’m sorry, but I need to check your wound.”

Even with tears in his eyes, Courfeyrac does as asked, helping Combeferre slide the coat off. Feuilly takes it, watching warily as Enjolras shivers even as he sweats, and lighting a candle so Combeferre can see better.

The blood is visible immediately, a splash of red on white. Knowing that even in this state Enjolras might not want to be so physically vulnerable in front of more than one person at a time, he asks Courfeyrac and Feuilly to help him get Enjolras to the bed before sending them each on an errand. Feuilly to see if he can secure them anything to eat at this hour—he suspects Enjolras’ cupboards are empty—and Courfeyrac to Joly, who lives just down the street, and will be able to lend Combeferre some Laudanum.

Feuilly goes without a word, putting a hand on Enjolras’ burning cheek before jamming his hat down over his auburn hair and leaving to tend to Combeferre’s request. Courfeyrac lingers, calling out to Feuilly to wait a moment. He presses a kiss to Enjolras’ temple, which makes Enjolras stir, but only just.

“Tell Joly not to come, tonight,” Combeferre says. “Tell him to wait until morning. I think things will be all right here, I just need to tend to it.”

One corner of Courfeyrac’s lips tug upward. “What army should I bring to stop Joly, pray tell?”

Combeferre smiles a little. “Tell him he only need wait until morning. And tell him he can chide me for not telling him about the wound all he likes, in return.”

Courfeyrac bounds after Feuilly, and then, Combeferre is left alone with Enjolras. He studies the familiar face, fever-bright red flowers blooming hot in those pale cheeks. Enjolras has been ill once or twice since their friendship began, though nothing quite like this, and it’s odd, still, to see him so vulnerable. Combeferre doesn’t normally have to worry about Enjolras, not in this sense. Enjolras is intense in every possible way—the glare that could stop a man in his tracks, the smile that could make you believe in anything, the charm that wins hearts, and the swiftness with which he might knock an enemy’s feet out from under him. It melds with Enjolras’ quiet, that softness he shares with people he trusts, the look on his face when he watches their friends in the back room of the Café Musain. Combeferre pushes some of the sweaty strands of over-long fair hair away from Enjolras’ forehead, his hand coming away damp.

“Enjolras…” he mutters, knowing he needs to clean and re-bandage the wound, knowing he needs to see what he can do for the fever, but for a moment he just lets the grief and the worry breathe between them, a gray, ripped, tattered thing caught in the summer’s golden breeze. He thumbs away some of the sweat at Enjolras’ hairline with deep, abiding affection. “Don’t you know you don’t have to carry the world on your shoulders?” 

* * *

Enjolras jolts awake.

He remembers, vaguely, falling to his sitting room floor. And then…blackness. Blankness. And…Combeferre? Voices. More than just Combeferre. There’s something cool and damp on his forehead and he feels…cold. Hot? Both.

Someone exhales a breath nearby, and Enjolras turns his head. He aches, still.

“There you are,” Combeferre says softly. “You had me worried.”

Enjolras reaches toward his forehead, attempting to remove whatever’s there. A cloth? It feels like a cloth, but Combeferre’s hand comes down to stop him.

“Let’s leave that, all right? Fever’s not as alarming as before, but you’re still warm, I want to try and cool you down.”

The room lays dark aside from a single candle on the bedside table, though there’s evidence that another was lit before, the wick burned down. Combeferre must have cleaned up his wound. Right. Yes. The wound. He made the suture come undone, didn’t he? He fainted.

Enjolras groans in an undignified way. “What happened?”

“ _Well_ …” Combeferre leans forward from the armchair, folding his hands atop the bed. “I think I should be asking that of you, but to catch you up, you missed meeting Courfeyrac, Feuilly, and I, we came looking for you, only to find you passed out feverish on your sitting room floor, bleeding. I cleaned the wound, fixed it up, but you’re going to need bed rest for a few days until your fever is gone.”

“But I…” Enjolras attempts to protest, though he doesn’t have a good reason, exactly. It just feels strange to think of resting when his mind is telling him he must not stop, not after what happened.

Combeferre holds up a hand, a little stern. “The wound’s infected, Enjolras. Not badly so, as far as I can tell, but enough to make you ill, and you will not make it worse under my watch. Joly will be by to check my work in the morning, no doubt. Courfeyrac went to get some Laudanum from him, and Feuilly went to retrieve some food. Your cupboards were nearly bare, Enjolras. It’s not like you. Surely sometimes you might need encouragement to put your work down and sleep, but I don’t often have to worry about you taking care of yourself. I feel as it more often it’s you telling me to pull _my_ nose out of whatever I’ve fixated on to rest.”

“I’m sorry,” Enjolras whispers, knowing he ought not argue about the Laudanum, though his one experience with the stuff when he broke his arm at eighteen left him with a distaste for it. “I didn’t mean to worry you.”

“Enjolras…” Combeferre smiles a little, taking his hand. “I worry more if you don’t tell me what’s the matter. Why did I find you passed out on your floor?”

“I…” Enjolras shifts a bit against the pillows so he can sit up, trying not to disturb the cloth on his head. “I was feeling…odd, so I went for a walk.”

Combeferre furrows his brow. “Enjolras.”

“I know, I know,” Enjolras says, sincere in his confession. “You told me not to aggravate it.”

He looks away from Combeferre, feeling those tears from earlier, the tears he wouldn’t allow, threatening him again. Combeferre tugs on his hand, all but forcing his attention.

“Does odd mean sad? Enjolras, you’re allowed to feel sad about what happened. About the outcome of all of this. It’s natural.”

“I know…” Enjolras hears his voice grow husky, the tears brimming up up up. “I just…I want to keep going. I can’t stop. We can’t stop. I’m afraid if I let myself feel this then it will be like giving up. I can’t give up. There’s too much left to do, there’s…”

Combeferre moves from the chair and Enjolras shifts over, making room for him on the bed.

“We were all hoping for a different outcome,” Combeferre says. “And I know you and I sometimes might disagree on the slowness or swiftness of what we seek to achieve. This isn’t what we wanted, but I do think we’re further down the road than before. Those in power had to make a change, even if it wasn’t what we sought. The people spoke, and something happened. _Something_ inched forward. Hopefully next time we can take a bound, instead.”

“Yes,” Enjolras whispers. “ I know I just….people say the Revolution moved so fast that we were bound to lose it all, that the blood that was spilled was too much to build anything upon, but whatever we have lost, we couldn’t lose the ideas that the Revolution left behind, because those ideas changed the world. I worry…I worry now that this new king will preach just enough of those ideas to fool people and make them complacent for wanting the fighting to end. That it will make me complacent.”

“You don’t know what the word _complacent_ means, and you couldn’t give up even on your worst day,” Combeferre says, running the back of his hand down Enjolras’ cheek. “Grief isn’t giving up. Grief is…letting yourself mourn what’s lost. Letting yourself mourn disappointment. If you don’t, then it will just keep eating away at you. I know I’m not always the best at being frank with myself, sometimes I’d rather throw myself into some strange new hobby instead, but I do know that you can’t carve out a future without grieving what you must in the present. You are so resilient, Enjolras. But you have to give your soul a rest. You have to replenish.”

Those words are the ones that make the tears from earlier come spilling out. It comes slow and quiet at first, the tears hot and inevitable and pouring down his cheeks.

Once those first ones come, they all come.

“Enjolras?” Combeferre asks, so gently it makes Enjolras cry more, because he didn’t listen to Combeferre, he didn’t just tell his friends the truth about his feelings and his wound because he was too caught up in his own head.

“I’m sorry,” Enjolras says, even though he knows Combeferre doesn’t want him to. “I just…”

Combeferre gingerly removes the cloth from Enjolras’ forehead and pulls him into an embrace. Enjolras rests his head on Combeferre’s shoulder, and he clings on tight, careful with his wound.

“You are allowed to be upset,” Combeferre whispers, and Enjolras thinks that there are so few people on this earth he allows himself to be this vulnerable with, but he has no regrets about this choice. “None of us will think less of you for it.”

“I’m afraid to let myself be.” Enjolras’ confession rings with quiet gravity in the room, a confession he only half-admitted to himself on his apparently feverish walk under the star-studded Parisian sky. Now, it comes past his lips, and he can’t take it back.

Combeferre pulls back from the embrace, his hands sliding into Enjolras’. “Can you tell me why?”

“Because I…” Enjolras struggles, a sob building in his chest, the flood of everything that’s happened, the crushing weight of his own disappointment, bearing down on him. This is why some people say never to hope, because it hurts too much, but he can’t do anything _but_ hope. He’s never been able to do anything but hope, and other people’s cynicism in the face of that hope wounds him. “I…I don’t know who I am if I’m not moving forward. People expect me to move forward I have to…”

Combeferre runs a hand through Enjolras’ hair, sweeping it from his face. “You need to rest.”

“I…”

“Enjolras, look at me.”

Given he didn’t heed Combeferre’s earlier warnings about aggravating the wound, Enjolras can’t do anything but heed him now.

“Courfeyrac, Feuilly, and I found you passed out on the floor of your sitting room from fever and no doubt exhaustion, too. For as many times as I’ve perhaps said you ought to take a break and go to bed a bit earlier…” He stops when Enjolras protests, smiling a little. “I know I keep odd hours, too, but I can usually count on you to take care of yourself. You lecture Feuilly when you feel he isn’t resting enough. You take wine bottles out of the hand of a sleeping Grantaire. You worry over Jehan and Bahorel staying out too late at whatever wild Romantic parties they go to. What happened tonight isn’t like you. It frightened me.”

“I didn’t mean to frighten you.”

Combeferre smiles wider. “I don’t want you to apologize, I know you didn’t do it on purpose. But as much as some of our friends may joke, you are a human being, and not the embodiment of France.”

Enjolras smiles just a little, and as the tension in his shoulders releases, he feels the exhaustion flooding through him. “Are you sure?”

“Given the bleeding infected wound?” Combeferre arches one eyebrow. “I’m quite certain. You’ll be all right, but I’m staying here with you for a few days. No arguments.”

“All right,” Enjolras says. “I’d like that.” He pauses, one last anxiety sitting his sharp in his chest. “I think…I think earlier, I felt as if, in the face of all this that my hope, my…what was it Joly called it once?” Enjolras wiggles his fingers in the air, the fatigue getting the better of him. “Defiant optimism. That maybe…it was a failing, in this case. A disregard of reality, or facts. But then…it’s always served me well to look forward beyond the present, hasn’t it? It’s up to us, to create that better world, whatever state the current one may be in.”

“Yes.” Combeferre presses a kiss to Enjolras’ forehead, urging him to lay back down. “I’d say so. That defiant optimism of yours has certainly inspired me on my own bad days. But…” Combeferre raises a finger, making Enjolras meet his eyes. “You need to lean on us sometimes, you know. I’m sure Courfeyrac will remind you of it as soon as he returns.” 

The door to Enjolras’ flat opens at just that moment, Courfeyrac and Feuilly’s voices floating inside.

“Hello!” Courfeyrac calls out, with more cheer than one ought to expect for the situation at hand. “I just wanted to let you know that there’s a smear of blood on the floor, in here.”

“Courfeyrac,” Feuilly chides in a loud whisper that isn’t really a whisper at all. “Enjolras might be sleeping.”

“I’m not,” Enjolras says, his voice a little hoarse from the earlier crying, though he forces himself not to feel shy about it. “Please come in.”

There’s the sound of one of them laying some parcels down before the bedroom door flies open a moment later and Courfeyrac steps inside with a bottle of Laudanum in hand, a bright green ribbon tied around the neck. Joly’s doing for certain, though the ribbon is likely a donation from Musichetta.

“You’re alive!” Courfeyrac proclaims with a little too much glee, the worried glimmer in his eyes betraying his real feelings. “I’m so thrilled.” He lays the bottle down on the bedside table, shooting a look at Combeferre. “It took every ounce of my strength to prevent Joly from heading straight here this evening, Combeferre. He said he would be here early.” He leans down, putting a kiss on Enjolras’ cheek and speaking a little more softly. “How’s the patient?”

“Better now,” Enjolras says, even as another shiver passes over him, though less violently than before. “I’m sorry to have worried you.” He looks up at Feuilly, who’s come to stand on the other side of the bed. “And you, Feuilly.”

Feuilly reaches for Enjolras’ hand, and it’s only then that Enjolras realizes how sweaty his skin is. “It’s been a difficult few days,” he says. “I thought you didn’t seem yourself, but I’m sure Combeferre will have you on the mend soon.”

“I’m afraid Feuilly is kinder than me,” Courfeyrac chimes in, doing his best Combeferre impression as he furrows his eyebrows, which is hardly threatening. “Next time you get slashed by a bayonet Enjolras, I expect to know about it.”

Enjolras bites his lip against a smile, wondering what he was ever thinking by keeping secrets from his friends. “Yes, Courfeyrac. Of course.”

“How did you end up aggravating it?” Feuilly asks.

“I…” Enjolras blushes, a little. “I went for a walk. To clear my head.”

“Enjolras,” Courfeyrac says with a melodramatic gasp. “That’s Bahorel sort of behavior. Or me. What’s gotten into you?”

Enjolras laughs, though he stops when it makes the wound ache. “Please, don’t tell Bahorel.”

“Oh…” Courfeyrac gives him a wicked grin. “I certainly shall.”

There’s a space, between them. A moment of silence for all they’re not saying and all that might have been. For everything that happened in those three days. For everything they’re fighting for.

“I was feeling heavy, tonight,” Enjolras say. “Heavy with the news we’ve gotten. But I should have brought it to all of you, rather than hiding myself away. I’m sorry for it. I expect so much of the world that sometimes I expect too much of myself.”

Feuilly sits on the edge of the bed. “The world would do better to live up to your expectations. But you always live up to those of your friends, Enjolras.”

Those sweet, simple words, finally make the remaining heaviness dissipate. The sadness isn’t gone. The grief. But having these three friends around him, their assurances, the way he can be vulnerable with them in a way he never has been with anyone in his life, sets his heart a little more at ease.

The world is dark, tonight. But there’s light hovering on the horizon, glowing yellow-orange at the edge of the black sky. Enjolras falls asleep thinking of that light, his friends scattered around him and a single candle flickering on his bedside table.


End file.
